Clean Fuel Scammer|Facing 10 Years in Stir

HOUSTON (CN) – A Texas businessman faces 10 years in prison and $51 million in restitution for defrauding the EPA by claiming he was producing millions of gallons of biodiesel fuel. Philip Joseph Rivkin aka Felipe Poitan Arriaga pleaded guilty Tuesday to mail fraud and making false statements about his Houston-based Green Diesel company. The EPA sent after Green Diesel in April 2012, claiming it made $29 million by selling bogus renewable fuel credits to oil companies and brokers. Federal agents arrested him on June 18, 2014 after Guatemala deported him for having fraudulently obtained Guatemalan citizenship. The next day he was indicted on 68 counts, including Clean Air Act false statements, wire fraud, mail fraud, and for illegal money transactions. The indictment also sough forfeiture of more than $29 million in cash, a Lamborghini, a Maserati and a Bentley, an airplane and millions of dollars worth of art.